1. Sherman to Sheridan, August 26, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

2. Five of these companies had but recently returned from Omaha and Chicago, where they were posted during the railroad riots in July. Price, Across the Continent, 167-68. For a history of Camp Brown, see McDermott, Dangerous Duty, 105-11.

3. Crook, "Report," 90; Cheyenne Daily Leader, August 31, 1877; and Hart to Sheridan, telegram, September 5, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File. As of August 30, Sheridan wanted Crook to send out some Shoshone scouts and "invite unconditional surrender of Joseph's band." In preparation for confronting the Nez Perces, however, Sheridan directed that 250 Sioux scouts under White Horse be sent to accompany Major Hart's battalion. Sheridan to Sherman, telegram, August 30, 1877, item 5542, roll 338, Nez Perce War Papers; and Cheyenne Daily Leader, November 2, 1877. Only 150 actually departed Red Cloud Agency on August 30 for Hart's command. Apparently, the scouts were recalled on Crook's advice. Lieutenant Colonel Robert Williams, Assistant Adjutant General, Department of the Platte, to Sheridan, telegram, August 30, 1877, roll 282, Letters Received, Adjutant General's Office, June 1877-October 1877, Sioux War Papers. For Crook's involvement in the Nez Perce campaign vis-à-vis the unfolding events at Camp Robinson, Nebraska, surrounding Crazy Horse's death, see Buecker, Fort Robinson, 110-13.

4. Sheridan sent word to Hart to "make for Stinking Water." With the help of the Sioux scouts, Sheridan wrote, "you will be able to kill or capture the hostile band of Nez-Perces . . . ," and "if you should get on their trail do not give it up till you overtake them." Enclosed in Sheridan to Williams, Assistant Adjutant General, Department of the Platte, August 30, 1877, roll 282, Letters Received, AGO, June 1877-October 1877, Sioux War Papers. Major Hart's battalion consisted of Companies B (Captain Robert H. Montgomery), H (Captain John M. Hamilton), I (Captain Sanford C. Kellogg), and L (First Lieutenant Charles H. Rockwell), along with twenty-five scouts headed by the noted frontiersman Frank Grouard. Second Lieutenant Edwin P. Andrus was adjutant. Wheeler, Buffalo Days, 202-3. On September 4, Sheridan had received a suggestion from Gibbon "that Hart be pushed up Stinking Water as far as he can go. Would it not be well to put Merritt up into the park on [Captain William A.] Jones [1873] trail [east of Yellowstone Lake] to pick up any straggling hostiles[?] . . . It is not impossible finding themselves headed off by Sturgis that they may turn back & make their way south by the trail East of the lake & so reach Snake river again." Gibbon to Sheridan, telegram, September 4, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

5. Crook to Sheridan, September 10, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

6. Ibid.; Assistant Adjutant General (Robert Williams) to Sheridan, August 27, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File; Sheridan to Adjutant General (E. D. Townsend), August 28, 1877, item 5398, roll 337, Nez Perce War Papers; Cheyenne Daily Leader, September 13, 1877; Chicago Tribune, September 12, 1877; and King, Indian Campaigns, 86. Merritt's command consisted of Companies C (Captain Emil Adams), D (Captain Samuel S. Sumner), E (Captain George F. Price), F (Captain J. Scott Payne), K (Captain Albert E. Woodson), and M (Second Lieutenant Charles H. Watts), Fifth Cavalry; and Company K (Captain Gerald Russell), Third Cavalry. Merritt's adjutant was Charles King, his regimental quartermaster First Lieutenant William P. Hall, and his medical officer Assistant Surgeon Charles Smart. Second Lieutenant Hoel S. Bishop commanded the Shoshone scouts. Army and Navy Journal, September 23, 1877.

7. Crook, "Report," 89-90; Army and Navy Journal, September 23, 1877; New York Herald, September 23, 1877; "Record of Medical History of Fort Washakie," 55, 56, 59; King, Indian Campaigns, 86-88; Price, Across the Continent, 168; Wheeler, Buffalo Days, 202-4, 206; DeBarthe, Life and Adventures of Frank Grouard, 188-89 (in which Grouard confused Hart's command, with which he served, with Merritt's); Daly, "U.S. vs. Joseph," 44; and Hedren, "Eben Swift's Army Service," 148-49.

8. First Lieutenant George W. Baird to Sturgis, August 11, 1877, Baird Papers.

9. Miles to Sturgis, August 12, 1877, ibid.

10. With Sturgis, the questions seemed not to do with his bravery but with his judgment. For his background, see Cullum, Biographical Register, 2:278-80; Warner, Generals in Blue, 486-87; Boatner, Civil War Dictionary, 816-17; and Hammer, Biographies of the Seventh Cavalry, 5.

11. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 507; Regimental Returns . . . Seventh Cavalry, August 1877, roll 72; and Mills, Harvest of Barren Regrets, 298. General Terry's original plan was to send out the battalion of Second Cavalry that was under Miles's command, but as that unit was scouting for Sioux in the Little Missouri country to the east, Milesanticipating the need for troops to head off the Nez Perceshad already dispatched Sturgis's Seventh cavalrymen by the time Terry's directive arrived. Miles to Assistant Adjutant General, Department of Dakota, August 19, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

12. For details of the rations problem, see Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 4-8.

13. Baird to Sturgis, August 16, 1877; and Miles to Sturgis, August 19, 1877, Baird Papers.

14. Hare, "Report of Lieut. L. R. Hare," 1677 (reprinted as After the Battle).

15. Fuller left the Tongue River Cantonment on the night of August 11. Years later he stated that "I was ordered to make all practicable speed, and if practicable, reach Ft. Ellis in five days, there to deliver my dispatches to the commanding officer to be forwarded to General Sherman, who was then in the national park, and whom [Brevet] General Miles desired to have advised that the Indians might pass through the Park, as they afterwards did, after which I was to get into communication with the Governor of Montana and General Gibbon, then colonel of the Seventh Infantry. . . . In the meantime, any information [that] might be received was to be communicated to [Brevet] General Sturgis." Fuller's account in Goldin, Biography, chap. 14, 289-97.

16. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 508.

17. Miles to Sturgis, August 26, 1877, ibid.

18. Miles to Sturgis, August 27, 1877, ibid.

19. Beyond the sources cited above, the early movements of Sturgis's command are described variously in Goldin to L. V. McWhorter, August 30, 1929, and September 10, 1929, folder 177, McWhorter Papers; Hare, "Report of Lieut. L. R. Hare," 1676-78; Goldin, Biography, 288-89, 297-301; Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 204-6; Benteen to wife, August 11, 1877, in Carroll, Camp Talk, 84-85; Sturgis to Potts, August 23, 1877, reprinted in Paul Phillips, "Battle of the Big Hole," 79; and Bonney and Bonney, Battle Drums and Geysers, 76-77.

20. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 509.

21. On this date, Captain Benteen wrote: "To-day we labored under the impression for a while that we found the Nez Perces, caused by six of our indian [sic] scouts . . . firing into a herd of elk. M Co. went out to ascertain the cause of the firingand commenced shooting elk themselves. 'Boots and Saddles' were soundedand we awaited developments. Soon the six indians came in." Benteen to wife, September 5, 1877, in Carroll, Camp Talk, 90-91. For descriptions of the fishing, see Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 8; and Benteen, "Trouting on Clark's Fork," 234-35.

22. Sturgis's September 6, 1877, notice "To the Miners and others at the Smelting Works" was also published in the Bozeman Times, September 13, 1877.

23. Yellow Wolf and Otskai shot these men while scouting for the main body of the Nez Perces. Yellow Wolf also claimed they attacked the party transporting the wounded man to the agency. For particulars, see McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 182-84.

24. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 510.

25. In his often confused accounts of Sturgis's movements, Goldin stated that on this or another night pickets fired on a horseman in the darkness and next morning found unshod pony tracks in the vicinity. See, for example, Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 210-11; and Goldin to McWhorter, September 27, 1933, folder 177, McWhorter Papers.

26. Hare, "Report of Lieut. L. R. Hare," 1678. Details of the march to the Stinking Water, from a former enlisted man's perspective, are in Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 10-11; Goldin, Biography, 301-9; and Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 206-12.

27. It was Sturgis's trail in this area that Merritt found one week later.

28. On the eleventh, Hare commented, "on coming down the mountain-side it was found that the Indians had gone down Clark's Fork the same day that we had started for the Stinkingwater." Hare, "Report of Lieut. L. R. Hare," 1679. This assessment of Sturgis's maneuver to the Stinking Water is based upon data contained in the above-cited works, as well as in Regimental Returns . . . Seventh Cavalry, September 1877, roll 72; Goldin to McWhorter, March 20, 1939, August 30, 1929, and December 4, 1934, folders 159 and 177, McWhorter Papers; and Roy Johnson, Jacob Horner, 17-18. A route at some variance with the above is given in Mills, Harvest of Barren Regrets, 299-303.

29. Howard to Sturgis, September 8, 1877, entry 897, box 1, part 3, 1877, U.S. Army Continental Commands.

30. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 277.

31. This assessment of the Nez Perces' course in reaching Clark's Fork is based on communication with Stuart Conner, Michael Bryant, and Kenneth J. Feyhl, of Billings, Mont., who jointly over many years have worked to determine that route as precisely as possible. Of great benefit to this study has been Stuart Conner, letters to author, January 18, 1996, February 2, 1996, February 9, 1996, and April 11, 1996; Kenneth J. Feyhl, letter to author, February 8, 1996; and Michael Bryant, Stuart Conner, and Kenneth J. Feyhl, various telephone communications with author, February 1996.

32. Mason to wife, September 11, 1877, in Davison, "A Century Ago," 15.

33. It is unclear exactly how many prospectors were killed, or whether they had been killed in one spot or several. Fisher accounted for three bodies found on Clark's Fork ("they were Danes or Norwegians from the Black Hills") and mentioned finding the German whose two colleagues had been killed on Crandall Creek. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 277. Redington, in "Scouting in Montana," 59, stated only that the scouts had found where the Nez Perces "had cleaned out a prospector's camp." He gave no number. Sutherland, writing in the Portland Daily Standard, October 5, 1877, said that eight men had been killed, four of them Scandinavians named Olsen, Kannard, Anderson, and Nelson.

34. Mason to wife, September 11, 1877, in Davison, "A Century Ago," 15.

35. Howard to Sturgis, September 10, 1877, entry 897, box 1, part 3, 1877, U.S. Army Continental Commands.

36. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 510.

37. New York Herald, October 1, 1877. "What hurt us worse than all else," remembered Private Goldin years later, "was the discovery that the Indian trail entered the valley hardly more than a mile or two above the camp from which we had so recently started on that night march [September 8]. Had we remained where we were the Indians would almost have walked into our arms." Goldin, Biography, 310.

38. See Howard to Sturgis, September 11, 1877, in Howard, "Report," 622. Sturgis originally desired to send one of his battalions under Major Merrill or Captain Benteen rapidly ahead to find the Indians, but was deterred by his officers from thus splitting his command. Benteen to Goldin, November 17, 1891, in Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 203.

39. Howard, "Report," 623. See also Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 510.

40. Goldin, Biography, 311.

41. Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 13.

42. The movements of Howard and Sturgis on Clark's Fork are documented in the sources quoted above, as well as in Hare, "Report of Lieut. L. R. Hare," 1679; Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 277-78; Connolly, Diary, September 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 1877; Goldin to McWhorter, February 27, 1929, folder 159, McWhorter Papers; Goldin to Earl A. Brininstool, January 13, 1929, Brininstool Collection; Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 58-59; Sutherland, Howard's Campaign, 40-41; William White, Custer, Cavalry, and Crows, 140-41; Pickard, Interview; Andrew Garcia account in Billings Gazette, August 14, 1932; Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 213-15; and John Carpenter, "General Howard," 140.

43. Weptas Nut (No Feather), Interview; and Yellow Bull's account in Curtis, North American Indian, 8:168. See also Francis Haines, Nez Perces, 265-66; and Josephy, Nez Perce Indians, 606-8. On their way down Clark's Fork, the tribesmen passed through or near the sites of the modern communities of Belfry, Bridger, Fromberg, Edgar, and Silesia, approximating the route of part of U.S. Highway 310 into Laurel. Dusenberry, "Chief Joseph's Flight," 49.

44. Harold Hagan, communication with author, Billings, Mont., May 24, 1995.

45. Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 61.

46. McWhorter's informants identified the six members of the Nez Perce party as Kalotas, Yellow Wolf, Sr., Iskiloom, Wattes Kunnin (Earth Blanket), John Mulkamkan, and Owhi. McWhorter, Hear Me, 457-58 n. 26. In another list, a seventh man's name was given as Tomsusliwi (complete name is illegible, but is probably Tumsuslehit [Rosebush]). List of Nez Perce informants to L. V. McWhorter.

47. The warriors who traveled as far as thirty miles to reach the area of present Huntley probably did not rejoin the main group until late that day, after the fight with Sturgis was over. Accounts of the Yellowstone Valley raiding by the Nez Perces on September 13, 1877, are often confusing and unclear, seemingly sometimes combining two or more events into one. This account is based on information in Bozeman Times, September 20, 1877; Portland Daily Standard, October 5, 1877; Fort Benton Record, September 21, 1877; Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 201-2; Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 221-22; Cascade Courier, February 28, 1930; Billings Gazette, June 30, 1927; Forrest Young account in "Forrest Young," Billings Gazette, undated clipping (ca. 1945), IndiansWars1877, vertical files, Parmly Billings Library, Billings, Mont.; Ed Forrest account in Billings Gazette, September 14, 1941; "Joe Cochran, 'First Resident of Billings,'" unidentified newspaper (Billings Gazette?), clipping apparently dated 1934, Montana scrapbook 3, Parmly Billings Library, Billings Mont.; Billings Gazette, July 6, 1958; Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 59, 60; and Redington, "The Stolen Stage Coach." See also Joseph M. V. Cochran claim, no. 2391, entry 700, and Bela B. Brockway claim, no. 3202, entry 700, Claim for Indian Depredations, U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. In 1882, the Indian agent on the Oakland Reservation, Indian Territory, presented Cochran's claim to Joseph and other Nez Perces. A warrior named Multitude said that he had taken part in the raid and acknowledged having taken some items, but that most had been abandoned soon afterwards. Joseph told the agent: "When the war broke out between my people and the whites, the property of either that fell into the other's hands was considered to belong to the captors; it was the fortune of war. . . . If we had money we might consider this claim and perhaps pay it; but we have nothing now to pay with. All our property fell into the hands of the whites." "Proceedings of a Council." Cochran never received payment. Billings Gazette, June 30, 1927, April 18, 1991. In an apparent tongue-in-cheek story related to his experiences on the campaign, J. W. Redington described the claim of a settler against the government for, among other things, a seven hundred dollar piano. Captain Fisher purportedly remarked: "Everything the scouts had was always in plain sight on their horses, and a piano would make a sightly package. There was no piano in the hostile camp at the wind-up; none dropped along the trail. There must be a mistake. It may have been a jewsharp that was stolen." Redington, "Who Stole the Piano?," 292-93.

48. Theodore Goldin identified this scout as Pawnee Tom. Goldin, Biography, 311. John W. Redington stated in 1930 that Sturgis's scouts saw a Nez Perce scout "on the northern bluffs" who disappeared as the command started on the trail. Redington, "The Stolen Stage Coach."

49. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 278. Goldin recalled hearing gunfire from downstream. Goldin, Biography, 311.

50. Redington, who watched the Nez Perces' procession up Canyon Creek, stated that the captured stage coach with its horses was following behind, driven by a warrior, and that "when these hostiles saw us they quickly unhitched the stage horses, mounted their cayuses, and dashed into skirmish line flanking their outfit. . . . The old stage was abandoned in the sagebrush." Redington, "The Stolen Stage Coach." See also Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 60; and Jocelyn, Mostly Alkali, 257. The firm of Gilman and Saulsbury, of Bozeman, operated the Bozeman-Miles City stage line, and the coach belonged to them. The vehicle was not a Concord coach, but a "jerky""a springless wagon with a covered body and two boots, fore and aft." The coach eventually went back into service on the line. "Wiley King, Tells of Stage-Coaching," unidentified newspaper (Billings Gazette?), undated clipping, Montana scrapbook 3, Parmly Billings Library, Billings, Mont.

51. Both Merrill and Benteen were officers of wide experience. Both had seen extensive Civil War service and had received numerous brevets for their respective performances in that conflict. Merrill (1834-1896) had joined the Seventh Cavalry in 1868 and had accompanied the regiment during its tenures in the West and South, but was on duty in the East when the Little Bighorn disaster occurred in June 1876. Cullum, Biographical Register, 2:624-25; and Hammer, Biographies of the Seventh Cavalry, 7. Benteen (1834-1898) was a forty-three-year-old Virginian who had joined the Seventh in 1866 and took part in much of its Indian campaigning and Reconstruction activities thereafter. As one of Custer's two principal subordinates at the Little Bighorn, Benteen found himself entangled in controversy for the rest of his military career. A brave officer, Benteen was also a chronic complainer who was ever ready to criticize those he considered his inferiors, which included just about everybody. Mills, Harvest of Barren Regrets; Heitman, Historical Register and Dictionary, 1:212; and Carroll and Price, Roll Call on the Little Big Horn, 117.

52. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 278.

53. Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . .1877, 570. General Howard, reporting later on the character of the soldiers' arms during the war with the Nez Perces, noted that "quite a number" of the Seventh Cavalry carried Springfield rifles rather than carbines, an exchange that Howard approved because "there is greater distance between the sights, and . . . the larger charge gives relatively greater velocity to the ball." He further believed that the cavalrymen "all felt increase of confidence from this fact." "Summary of Reports . . . Non-Effectiveness," 3. See also McChristian, Army of Marksmen, 37-38. The Seventh Cavalrymen at Canyon Creek did not carry the regulation M1858 cavalry sabres, according to Theodore Goldin. They had been turned in at the Tongue River Cantonment before the troops started for the field. "They were a useless appendage in an Indian campaign. . . . We [previously] used them as toasting forks, rattle snake killers and . . . tent poles for our dog [shelter] tents." Goldin to McWhorter, July 12, 1932, folder 32, McWhorter Papers.

54. Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 570.

55. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 278.

56. Benteen maintained that it was he who suggested this initiative to Sturgis. Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 203. Private Jacob Horner also confirmed that Benteen approached Sturgis and got permission for his movement. Roy Johnson, Jacob Horner, 20.

57. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 511.

58. Ibid.

59. The withdrawal of Benteen's command, not mentioned in the official reports, is referenced in Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 279. One of Howard's scouts who witnessed the engagement confirmed what apparently was this maneuver. The soldiers "would charge to the creek bank where the Nez Perces lay concealed, and who held their fire until the soldiers came close by, when the Indians would discharge a murderous volley, resulting in a confused stampede wherein were horses running in every direction; some with empty saddles, some unmanageable and running away with soldiers and men being wounded and others shot to pieces." Cruikshank, "Chasing Hostile Indians," 13.

60. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 511. Wrote Goldin many years later: "So far as I ever knew, Benteen did not capture any part of the pony herd which, with the retreating village was well out in the valley out of long range fire from our [Benteen's] column. Seeing that we could not reach the village, Benteen deployed in some scrub timber and had a long range fight with the Indians on the side of the bluffs and at the entrance to the canyon affecting but little." Goldin to McWhorter, August 13, 1933, folder 159, McWhorter Papers. A soldier named Pickard claimed that "we got several hundred of their horses. Our Indian scouts captured these." Pickard, Interview. And Sutherland wrote for the Portland Daily Standard, October 5, 1877, that about one hundred ponies "were run off by the Crow Indians."

61. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 279.

62. Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 570.

63. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 279. In most of his various writings, Goldin erroneously identified the officer in charge of the howitzers as Howard's son, Second Lieutenant Guy Howard, of the Twelfth Infantry, who had been in the army for less than one year (and who was probably not present at Canyon Creek but with his father coming down Clark's Fork). See, for example, Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 15, wherein Goldin stated that Lieutenant Howard fired the howitzers while they were still strapped to the pack mules in an incident so ridiculous that it could never have happened as described.

64. This despite claims to the contrary by Goldin and others. See, for example, Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 217; Goldin, Biography, 313; and an account of teamster Andrew Garcia in Billings Gazette, August 14, 1932. A former trooper told McWhorter that Sturgis directed a howitzer round be fired into the Nez Perces' pony herd to start the fighting. William C. Slaper to McWhorter, April 22, 1929, folder 159, McWhorter Papers. A newspaper correspondent suggested that the howitzer was to have played a major role in securing a victory at Canyon Creek. "An attempt was made to hem the hostiles in by taking possession of the rear end of the cañon with a howitzer, but, as the heights were all so steep, it was found impossible to drag the gun up, and the plan had to be abandoned and the Indians escaped." New York Herald, October 1, 1877. Wrote Sturgis: "In spite of energetic efforts on the part of Lieutenant Otis, that officer was unable to render his little gun available, as his animals were totally worn out." Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 511.

65. Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 15-16.

66. Goldin, Biography, 313-14. In a letter to McWhorter, Goldin provided more data about this movement. "I have no recollection that any communication came from Sturgis to Benteen [in fact, it did], but the latter finding he was making no headway [in the valley] figured that by moving to the left and passing around the end of this high bluff he might be able to force the Indian position. The squadron was mounted, G Troop under Lieut. Wallace on the right and the squadron at a gallop struck back along this high bluff. All went well for a short time, but the Indians were evidently closely watching our movement as ere we had gone half the distance along the face of this bluff, we were assailed by a heavy fire from the top. Lieut. Wallace charged on through, while H [M?] and I think it was B [Bendire's K, First Cavalry?] Troops hesitated for a few moments then, apparently without orders, the men charged the bluff. Only a few shots were fired and when we reached the top not an Indian was to be seen. We moved cautiously across the level plateau on top of the bluff until we reached the farther side, when we discovered the Indian[s] beyond rifle shot among the ravines. There was no use in pursuing them [as] they had every advantage." Goldin to McWhorter, February 3, 1933, folder 35, McWhorter Papers.

67. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 279-80.

68. Ibid., 280. Times for the start and end of the action were given by the wounded to Assistant Surgeon Holmes O. Paulding at the Tongue River Cantonment. Paulding to Medical Director, Department of Dakota, September 22, 1877, entry 624, box 1, Office of the Adjutant General; and also Return for Company G, September 1877, roll 72, Regimental Returns . . . Seventh Cavalry. In addition, this reconstruction of the Canyon Creek action is drawn from the following sources: Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, Benteen to Adjutant, Seventh Cavalry, September 18, 1877, and October 8, 1877, all in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 511-12, 569-71, 572, respectively; Regimental Returns . . . Seventh Cavalry, September 1877, roll 72; pen and ink sketch titled, "Fight at Cañon Creek, Sturgis," inset drawing in Fletcher, "Department of Columbia Map"; Fisher, "Plan of the [Canyon Creek] Battle Ground," (this manuscript map was prepared to accompany publication of Fisher's journal but was deleted before the volume went to press); Record of Engagements, 72; sketch map of Canyon Creek by John W. Redington, in Redington to McWhorter, April 1930, folder 159, McWhorter Papers; sketch map by I. D. O'Donnell, 1944, ibid.; Pickard, Interview; Lynch, Interview; Sutherland (who arrived later with Howard), Howard's Campaign, 41; Forrest Young account in "Forrest Young," Billings Gazette, undated clipping (ca. 1945), IndiansWars1877, vertical files, Parmly Billings Library, Billings, Mont. (see also Forrest Young account in Stanford Judith Basin County Press, February 13, 1930); Andrew Garcia account in Laurel Outlook, June 23, 1937 (reprinted in Laurel Outlook, August 5, 1954, and August 2, 1989); and particularly valuable research conclusions based upon on-site archeological finds contributed by Michael Blohm of Laurel, Mont. See Douglas D. Scott, "Historical Archaeological Overview . . . Canyon Creek,"4-6. See also Taylor, "Canyon Creek Battlefield," which is especially useful in its on-ground placement of activities during the battle and post-battle phases according to section/township designation.

The numerous materials associated with enlisted man Theodore W. Goldin appear to be of dubious merit and have been used cautiously. While Goldin did much writing late in his life, his memory appears to have been faulty on numerous matters relating to Canyon Creek, particularly as it related to command objectives and other affairs in which he as a private soldier had no special knowledge. He was, moreover, prone to exaggeration and apparent creation of yarns to add color to his accounts. His materials, however, are useful for events in which he personally participated. The sources in question are: Goldin, Biography, 311-14; Goldin, Bit of the Nez Perce Campaign, 13-17; Goldin, "Seventh Cavalry at Cañon Creek," 215-20 (which Goldin accused Brady, Northwestern Fights and Fighters, of rewriting for his book); letters to McWhorter, February 27, 1929, March 20, 1929, March 14, 1932, July 12, 1932, August 1, 1932, February 3, 1933, August 13, 1933, and December 4, 1934, all in folders 159 and 177, McWhorter Papers; and Goldin to Brininstool, January 13, 1929, Brininstool Collection. Goldin was a participant in the Little Bighorn battle, too, and his recollections of that affair are likewise suspect in several areas. For a sketch of his life and service, see Hammer, Biographies of the Seventh Cavalry, 143-44.

69. Quoted in Sheridan to Adjutant General, September 17, 1877, item 5828, roll 338, Nez Perce War Papers.

70. Paulding to Medical Director, Department of Dakota, September 22, 1877, entry 624, box 1, Office of the Adjutant General; "List of Wounded . . . Cañon Creek"; and New York Herald, September 23, 1877. In addition, Lieutenants Gresham and Nicholson appear to have suffered very slight wounds of unspecified nature. Cheyenne Daily Leader, September 23, 1877; Sheridan to Adjutant General, September 26, 1877, item 6002, roll 338, Nez Perce War Papers; addendum to Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 571; and Benteen to Adjutant, Seventh Cavalry, September 18, 1877, and October 8, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 571-72. A capsule biography of Brown (as well as several of the Canyon Creek wounded) is in Hammer, Biographies of the Seventh Cavalry, 210 and passim. See Appendix A for a complete list of the Canyon Creek army casualties.

71. Cruikshank, "Chasing Hostile Indians," 15. It must be stated that while Cruikshank's procedural description of the burials is likely correct, he was altogether wrong in his recollection of the number of casualties. Two of the Canyon Creek burials were exposed in December 1915 by workmen on the Cove Orchard Project. The remains, found about two hundred yards from Horse Cache Butte, were removed for reburial in Custer Battlefield National Cemetery, where they lie today. Billings Gazette, December 6, 1960 (citing issue of December 6, 1915). See also Glendolin Wagner, Old Neutriment, 223-26 n. 18.

72. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 280-81.

73. Major Lewis Merrill report, September 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 571.

74. San Francisco Chronicle, August 15, 1927.

75. Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 60.

76. Ibid.

77. Quoted in Roy Johnson, Jacob Horner, 19. See also Burdick and Hart, Jacob Horner, 21-22.

78. Quoted in Roy Johnson, Jacob Horner, 19.

79. Ibid., 19-20.

80. Lynch, Interview. Benteen acknowledged that he had carried a fishing pole in at least part of the action at Canyon Creek. See Benteen to Goldin, November 17, 1891, in Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 204. For examples of criticism directed toward Sturgis ("Sturgis should have given the word to charge in on that sagebrush flat and wind up the war."), see Redington to Colonel William Carey Brown, October 28, 1926, folder 8, box 12, William Brown Papers; Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 60; and Goldin to McWhorter, various letters as cited above, and his sundry accounts. And the scout Alexander Cruikshank said that "everyone felt that the General had blundered as he surely had a sufficient force to have corralled the entire Indian outfit." Cruikshank, "Chasing Hostile Indians," 14. The characteristically blunt Benteen wrote Goldin (whose views may have been thus colored): "From the fact of having struck the reds at Canyon Creek, what was left of Sturgis's reputation was saved. . . . Sturgis was never very warm with me after the Canyon Creek affair. Why? Because he knew that I thought he was a coward." Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 204. Strong censure was directed at Sturgis by Ami Frank Mulford in a generally worthless (yet frequently cited) account: "Sturgis posted himself on a bluff, with a body guard, fully a mile from the reds, and viewed proceedings through his field glass. A bullet from a long-range gun in the hands of an Indian . . . struck the ground a short distance in front of the General, who lowered his glass, remarking that it was getting dangerous up there, and got out of danger." Mulford, Fighting Indians!, 115. This is hearsay, if Mulford was where he was supposed to be during the combat. Furthermore, the commanding officer's position in the rear supervising the engagement would have been entirely appropriate. For Horner's complimentary remarks, see Burdick and Hart, Jacob Horner, 22. It must be noted that even had Sturgis managed to block the mouth of the canyon, there existed two other routes allowing egress to the plains just five miles east of Canyon Creek. Harold Hagan, communication with author, Billings, Mont., May 24, 1995.

81. Goldin to McWhorter, February 27, 1929, folder 159, Goldin to McWhorter, August 1, 1932, folder 177, and Goldin to McWhorter, September 10, 1929, folder 159, McWhorter Papers.

82. Slaper to McWhorter, April 22, 1929, folder 129, McWhorter Papers.

83. FitzGerald to wife, September 16, 1877, in FitzGerald, Army Doctor's Wife, 312.

84. McWhorter and Many Wounds, "Colonel Sturgis Fight"; and McWhorter, Hear Me, 461.

85. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 185.

86. Ibid., 186.

87. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 512; and McWhorter, "Fight with Sturgis." However, in McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 194, Yellow Wolf indicated that the Crows killed this man along with another named Wetyetmas Hapima (Surrounded Goose) the next day. Yellow Wolf stated that the only casualties were the three wounded men. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 186 n. 5. William Connolly recorded that he "saw 4 dedd [sic] Indians" on the battlefield. Connolly, "Diary," September 13, 1877. The reporter Thomas Sutherland (Howard's Campaign, 41) stated that six Nez Perce bodies were found on the field, a figure uncorroborated by other accounts.

88. McWhorter, Hear Me, 462. According to McWhorter, Teeto Hoonnod was "noted for his courage and strategic ability." In his defense, he was joined for a time by Swan Necklace, but evidently maintained his position alone until the families and horses passed inside the canyon walls. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 185 n. 3; and McWhorter, Hear Me, 462.

89. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 186-87. Theodore Goldin confirmed the presence of this barricade, writing that in the chase the next day, September 14, "we found the trail blocked by logs and boulders, evidently placed there by the fleeing Indians, and as we struggled through these obstacles or sought to remove them, we realized how completely we would have been exposed to ambush and annihilation." Goldin, Biography, 315.

90. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 187. In 1935 the aged warrior White Hawk told McWhorter that the Nee-Me-Poo camped a very far distance up the creek bottom. "Far across an open valley hemmed in by sloping hills, he designated where the trail entered a dark woods. Their camp that night, he said, was a considerable distance beyond, and he could not recall whether it was pitched by a stream or a spring." McWhorter and Many Wounds, "Colonel Sturgis Fight." See also McWhorter to Major Thomas A. Reiner, December 18, 1935, folder 159, McWhorter Papers. The modern route of the Burlington Northern Railroad along Canyon Creek probably closelyif not directlyparallels the Nez Perces' historical route for its entire distance through the canyon.

Nez Perce accounts of Canyon Creek testify to the loud reports of one of their guns during the fighting. On being questioned years later by L. V. McWhorter, the aged warrior Many Wounds recounted that a rifle capable of making such a noise had been for many years among the Nee-Me-Poo. McWhorter later learned that a large-caliber weapon, possibly a long-range Sharps buffalo gun weighing as much as fifteen pounds, had been captured on the Salmon by the young man, Shore Crossing (subsequently killed at the Big Hole). He further learned from Peopeo Tholekt that Poker Joe possessed such an arm at Canyon Creek and, after exhausting his ammunition for it, disposed of it by burying it among the rocks at the Nez Perce camp that night. McWhorter, Hear Me, 462-63 n. 37; McWhorter, "Poker Joe's Big Rifle"; and McWhorter to Reiner, December 18, 1935, folder 159, McWhorter Papers. Regarding Canyon Creek, correspondent Frank J. Parker noted that "that Indian with the loud reporting rifle was again heard, as he always is, and did his share of the killing." Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, October 2, 1877. See also Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 65.

91. Yellow Bull, Interview, BYU. For other brief accounts of Canyon Creek based largely on Nee-Me-Poo perspectives, see Garcia, Tough Trip Through Paradise, 292-93; Francis Haines, "Chief Joseph," 7; and Josephy, Nez Perce Indians, 608-10.

92. "Yellow Bull's Story." See also Yellow Bull, Interview, BYU; unclassified envelope 91, 541, Camp Manuscript Field Notes, Camp Papers, BYU; and Camp Manuscript Field Notes, Nez Perce Indian Wars 1, 138, Camp Papers, LBNM. Also, the supply of ammunitionmostly taken from the soldiers at White Bird Canyon, Big Hole, and other engagementswas clearly dwindling by this time. McWhorter, "Fight with Sturgis."

93. For other Nez Perce mention of Canyon Creek, see Joseph [Heinmot Tooyalakekt], "An Indian's Views," 427; "Story of Kawownonilpilp"; and Yellow Bull account in Curtis, North American Indian, 8:168, wherein it is stated that during the night following the fighting fifty Nez Perce men captured twenty-seven horses (their own?) from the soldiers.

94. Paulding to Medical Director, Department of Dakota, September 22, 1877, entry 624, box 1, Office of the Adjutant General; Major George Gibson to Assistant Adjutant General Department of Dakota, October 1, 1877, in Terry, "Report," 547; Burdick and Hart, Jacob Horner, 21; Coughlan, Varnum, 23; McWhorter, "Unpublished Incidents"; and Upton, Fort Custer, 40. A biographical sketch of Lawler is in Hammer, Biographies of the Seventh Cavalry, 146.

95. U.S. Army Gallantry and Meritorious Conduct, 82-84. All of the enlisted men had been recommended by Merrill and Benteen in their respective reports of September 1877.